San Diego, San Pedro and Santa Barbara have become the focal point of the rum runners operating on the Pacific coast . . . It is believed that the bulk of the rum fleet will arrive in southern California waters, literally flooding this part of the state with booze of all descriptions. –San Diego Union, May 12, 1925.
The “noble experiment†of Prohibition, which outlawed most manufacture, sales, and transportation of intoxicating liquor, began in 1920 with the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment.  An assortment of unintended consequences accompanied Prohibition, including a stunning rise in organized crime, such as the lucrative  “rum running†trade from America’s “Wet†neighbors—Canada and Mexico.
The story of The Rum Runners.